As a longtime Texas radio executive, Brian Purdy is acutely aware of the synergies and rivalries that unite and divide Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth. He hopes to put that knowledge to good use in his new role, announced this week, as dual overseer of CBS Radio’s stations in both cities.

Purdy, a former executive with Clear Channel Communications in Houston, adds oversight for CBS’ Houston stations, including KILT (610 AM), to his existing duties with the company’s Dallas stations.

He will split time between the cities but, at times, he plans to bring his employees in both cities together for some on-air trash talking.

“One of the best radio shows I’ve ever listened to was this fall, where our (Dallas) sports station and our CBS sports station in Baltimore went at it for a couple of hours before the Ravens-Cowboys game,” he said. “It was station-on-station, with listeners calling in from both markets, and it was awesome radio.

“We’ve got a natural opportunity here. Texans and Cowboys, Rockets and Mavs, Astros and Rangers, do not have best friends forever status. There’s nothing better in sport radio than love and hate, and we think this can help both stations. There’s a natural rivalry between the two markets that can generate some entertaining radio.”

Among Purdy’s pressing duties in Dallas is the probable acquisition for KRLD AM-FM of the Dallas Cowboys’ radio rights. In Houston, one of his primary duties will be to improve the revenue stream from CBS Radio’s Texans partnership.

“I don’t know of any industry that isn’t going through a difficult time,” he said. “We have to take the concept with the Texans of growing our partnership. We have to put more fans in the seats and generate more loyal customers, and I look forward to expanding that partnership.”

He also must bolster KILT’s sagging Arbitron ratings as of late. KILT remains the leader in middays and afternoon drive but has slipped to third in the critical morning drive daypart.

“I think we can move the needle,” he said. “It’s a crowded sports field. I think we can not only lift our share of the market but lift the entire sports share.”

UH sticks with 790

For those of you who question the future of sports talk on KBME (790 AM), it bears noting that the Clear Channel-owned station has re-upped for three years to broadcast University of Houston basketball and football games. In fact, 790 will air the UH spring game on April 18.

“We’re pleased to be back with them,” said UH athletic director Dave Maggard. “They have indicated they can do more in terms of coverage for us, and that’s always good news.”

Hannah Storm is working familiar ground by hosting Her Story, an ESPN documentary on the accomplishments of young female athletes, at 7 p.m. today. The show wraps up ESPN’s commemoration of Women’s History Month.

Storm, who will be honored May 1 by Literary Advance of Houston for her books on parenting, has been a sportswoman since her childhood as the daughter of ABA executive Mike Storen. As the mother of three daughters, she said enhanced appreciation of the value that sports offers for girls and young women.

“It’s a personal passion,” she said. “Trying to find sports that (her daughters) are interested in and to foster that love of sport and physical activity is a huge part of my motivation for entering this project.”

Tonight’s program includes segments on surfer Bethany Hamilton, who lost her left arm to a shark attack in 2003, and on Oklahoma basketball players Courtney and Ashley Paris, the daughters of former 49ers lineman Bubba Paris.

Segments of enhanced local interest focus on the below-normal participation rates of Hispanic girls in sports and on the Roller Derby boom that has extended from Austin to Houston and beyond.

Listening in

NBC Sports golf guru Tommy Roy will have an extra tape machine rolling in his production truck at the Shell Houston Open a week from Saturday, but nothing on the machine will make it on the air.

In conjunction with the PGA Tour, NBC will mike two caddies during the Shell’s third round to determine if the technology is sufficiently advanced and the chatter is sufficiently entertaining to employ the gear at future events.

“A camera will follow the action of that group, and we will record the caddies’ microphones as they make their way through the back nine,” Roy said.

Roy isn’t sure if wiring up caddies will be as effective as NBC’s practice of using shotgun microphones to pick up chatter from golfers and caddies.

“While I admire the chance to try to enhance the audio, I think part of it is flawed,” he said. “You’ll be able to hear the caddie, but as soon as the player is two or three steps away, you will no longer hear the players’ side of the conversation, which is part of the intriguing audio we’re looking for.”

Roy said NBC has had success in using shotgun mikes to eavesdrop on the likes of Phil Mickelson and caddie Jim “Bones” Mackay. Unfortunately, the network can’t use shotguns when the players are on the green.

NBC has also miked players during the so-called “challenge season” but added, “The problem is when you get two mikes going and talking over each other, it becomes confusing. The best is having a shotgun that is out there in the fairway eavesdropping.”

One reason for NBC’s success, Roy added, is that it has an audio guy in the production truck with a quick finger on the squelch button during live broadcasts.

“If somebody takes a bad shot, you can get language that isn’t appropriate for Sunday afternoon,” he said. “But we’ve learned that as soon as you see a visible reaction, you shut the mike down and you don’t hear the diatribe that follows.”

NBC has Tiger Woods at the Arnold Palmer Invitational on Saturday and Sunday from Orlando before moving on to Redstone Golf Club’s Tournament Course for the Shell Houston Open next weekend.

“The great thing they’ve done is to replicate Augusta National’s conditions,” Roy said. “So it makes it quite fun to cover and draws an even better field.”

Miller on Tejada

Since ESPN’s annual MLB conference call coincided with Thursday’s sentencing of Astros infielder Miguel Tejada, we asked ESPN’s Jon Miller and Steve Phillips (Joe Morgan, alas, earlier had left the line) for their thoughts on the matter.

“I don’t forgive anybody for not being truthful under oath,” Miller said. “I think it’s fortunate that the deal he got was probation.

“At the same time, I’d like to see everybody have the opportunity – every player baseball to have the opportunity – to do what he had to do, which is go under oath and answer those questions.”

Miller added, “Let’s put them all under oat and have them announce yes or no, I didn’t do it, I know guys who did it, I don’t know guys who did it. Fair is fair.”

Phillips added, “I think it’s a proper resolution to what happened, and he’s handling it the right way.”

Four DVRs, no waiting

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but Houston continues at the bottom of NCAA Tournament ratings on CBS. Games on KHOU (Channel 11) average a 2.9 Nielsen household rating, down from 3.4 a year ago. That ranks 54th among the 56 major markets, beating only Miami-Fort Lauderdale and Tampa-St. Petersburg. …

Upcoming on Fox Sports Houston are preview shows on the Shell Houston Open at 6:30 p.m. today and the Astros at noon and 7 p.m. today. Both will re-air through Tuesday. … FSH also airs its first Dynamo game of the season at 9:30 p.m. Saturday. The Dynamo-San Jose game also will air on KHOU’s 11.2 digital channel (channel 310 on Comcast). …

FSH also says 123 of its 147 Astros games will air in HDTV, up from 92 HD games a year ago. Yes, that means 24 will air only in standard-def. Oh, the humanity. …

MLB Network’s Thursday night game of the week schedule will include the April 23 Dodgers-Astros game at Minute Maid Park. Matt Vasgersian and Joe Magrane will call the action. Bob Costas will call the April 16 Indians-Yankees game, the first game played at the new Yankee Stadium and his first network baseball broadcast since the 2000 ALCS. …

NBC has migrated most of its world figure skating championships coverage to Oxygen, including three segments today – the taped original dance at 3:30 p.m., the ladies’ short program at 5:30 p.m. and the free dance at 11 p.m. NBC has the ladies’ free skate at 8 p.m. Saturday. Michelle Kwan and Dick Button will contribute to the NBC broadcast. …

KTBU’s (Channel 55) Todd Freed will present his annual high school awards on the next edition of High School Sports Live at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Guests will include Brittney Griner of Nimitz and Joey Brooks and Tim Frazier of Strake Jesuit. …

Jim Nantz will appear April 2 on CBS’ The Price is Right to introduce a showcase prize trip to the Final Four in Detroit. The segment was taped earlier this month. … Moving from the court to the links, the next segment of his Jim Nantz Remembers Augusta series will focus on Seve Ballesteros. The hour-long show airs at noon Sunday, April 12, before the final round of the Masters.

Nantz also will host Stories of Augusta at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, April 11. Segments on the show, produced for CBS by Mickey Holden of the Dallas-based Holden Production Group, include Ernie Ball, the only surviving competitor from the first Masters in 1934; University of Houston-ex Fred Couples’ 1992 win; and the Harmon brothers reminiscing about their father Claude Harmon’s 1948 win as the only club pro to capture the green jacket. …

Next on the release list from NFL Films and Warner Home Video are season-in-review DVD sets for the Steelers (four DVDs) and Cardinals (one DVD) and the fourth installment in the NFL Greatest Follies series. …

CBS Sports voice Dick Enberg in May will receive the second annual Vin Scully Lifetime Achievement Award in broadcasting from Fordham University. PBS veteran (and former Dallas-Fort Worth newsman) Jim Lehrer and singer Paul Simon also will be honored. …

ESPN2 will re-air the Larry Bird-Earvin Johnson faceoff in the 1979 NCAA Tournament championship game between Michigan State and Indiana State at 6 p.m. Friday, April 3, and 1 p.m. Sunday, April 5. … Still on word on where

GolTV will air nine 2010 World Cup qualifying matches involving European sides Saturday through April 2. Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Russia will be among the combatants. ESPN2 has U.S. games against El Salvador at 8 p.m. Saturday and Trinidad and Tobago at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. …

The economic downturn is taking a toll on Olympic sport governing bodies, too. Agreements between USA Gymnastics, USA Swimming and USA Track & Field and the Los Angeles-based Wasserman Media Group have petered out in unproductive fashion, and the three groups are now on the hunt for new sponsorship and digital domain opportunities.

USA Gymnastics has done some work in recent weeks with former Wasserman hand Steve McCain, a member of the 2000 Olympic team. McCain, who grew up in Houston and graduated from high school here before moving to the Left Coast, will be inducted later this year into the federation’s hall of fame.